Bring back River Walk’s merry glow

A version of this column was published Dec. 1, 2012, in the Express-News.

After they were raved about in press previews, subsequently lit and panned by the public — after the squirrels chewed through them — the purplish-blue-hued LED Christmas lights of 2011 no longer reside on the River Walk.

A year ago, the LEDs, wrapped around tree trunks, drew ample criticism because they were a complete departure from the incandescents that hung so elegantly from the River Walk’s tree canopy year after year.

This year, the lights hang once again, and the city, which took over River Walk lights in 2011, deserves credit for trying to right poor taste.

My problem is that they remain LEDs.

The incandescent lights (now embedded firmly in memory) emitted a warmth and glowed in such a way that they blended together to make a kind of festive holiday attire for the trees.

Last year, they were an icy bright blue, as tacky as Christmas sweaters. But at least you could see them, all bunched together on the trunks. The Las Vegas strip became a popular comparison in the public discourse.

This year? They are the visual equivalent of the sad horn that plays when someone loses on the “Price Is Right.” Duds. A great big old WOMP womp.

They are too dim.

And the colors are weird. These new strands of LEDs contain bulbs of red (good), green (great), white (so far so good), blue (uh) and yellow (what the?).

Instead of having a reaction, good or bad, I stared at them for minutes — not gazing in wonderment and awe, but staring in confusion. I was trying to decipher the colors, and there were also strange light clusters at the tops of seemingly every tree that I don’t recall with the incandescents.

Maybe it’s because I’m not used to them? That is the natural counterargument.

But here’s something that’s irrefutable: The new LEDs don’t reproduce well on camera. They appear as ambiguous specs of light like the kind some people try to pass off as specter orbs.

Maybe I just suck as a photographer. Shooting at night is tricky if you don’t know what you’re doing. But then I scanned the Express-News photo database for a good shot of the new LEDs from parade night a week ago. There were NONE. One of the photography editors said it was because the lights were too dim, rendering them difficult to capture even for pro photographers. Just imagine how disappointing you and I are going to be shooting them with our crappy point-and-shoot cameras.

In all fairness, Mayor Julián Castro deserves a ton of credit for his Light Up Downtown contest. Castro’s pet project seems to have galvanized downtown businesses and property owners to show their holiday spirit.

It has really caught on, and so far my favorite displays are the Palacio del Rio’s rooms, lit up in the shape of a Christmas tree, while another layer spells “LOVE,” and the Southern Pacific 794 locomotive, covered in 20,000 lights, on display at Sunset Station.

And the city is recycling the purple-blue LEDs and using them to decorate parks and other city-owned property, like at La Villita.

These may very well become tradition, and that would be great. But why mess with an old one? The River Walk with its hanging incandescents served as the centerpiece for downtown’s Christmas offerings. Yes, LEDs save energy. But the city’s own cost-benefit analysis showed a yearly savings of about $2,000 on the River Walk’s electric bill, when this project is approaching $1 million in the first two years.

Some holiday traditions in San Antonio have become mere memory, such as Joske’s Fantasyland. Here’s one the city has an opportunity to bring back next year.